Clara Lane, Well-known Matchmaker

GLENDALE, CALIF. — Clara Lane, a well-known matchmaker for 50 years who once estimated she brought together more than 25,000 couples, has died at 85.

At one time, her ads ran in hundreds of newspapers across the country. They said: ``You don`t have to spend another weekend alone.`` Clients paid her $350 to find companions.

Mrs. Lane was a native of Iowa who moved to New York and eventually to Los Angeles.

She opened the first of her Friendship Centers in New York in the 1930s, and they spread across the country. There were once 22 centers with 10,000 members, but the numbers had dwindled to only one center at the time of her death.